A startup that runs an 'app store' for genetics just raised $200 million

DFJ Growth Fund led the series B round, and former AOL CEO Barry Schuler, a partner at DFJ, is joining the company's board.

Helix has so far inked 47 partnerships with companies to run tests on the Helix platform. The tests range in cost from around $20 to hundreds of dollars.

A startup that runs a marketplace for DNA tests that cover everything from ancestry to your preference of wine has raised $200 million.

DFJ Growth Fund led the series B round, and former AOL CEO Barry Schuler, a partner at DFJ, is joining the company's board. Illumina, Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, Mayo Clinic, Sutter Hill Ventures, and Warburg Pincus, which had previously invested in Helix when it raised $100 million back in 2015, joined in the round as well.

The funding comes at a time when the DNA-testing field is exploding. In the past few years, the number of people taking DNA tests has picked up pace, with more than 12 million people sequenced, with almost 10 million of those tests happening since 2016.

Helix, which launched its marketplace in July 2017, definitely felt the effect of the increasing interest, Helix CEO Robin Thurston said, though he did not disclose the number of people who've taken a Helix test.

Hollis Johnson
How Helix works

Every time you do a DNA test and send in a sample of spit, parts of your same genes are just getting sequenced again and again. Helix wants to cut out that physical step.

Instead of sending your spit nine different places for nine different tests, you could just let companies access your genetic code. Say you want to learn about your ancestry. You can pay for National Geographic's Geno 2.0 test and send in your tube of spit to Helix. Your results would come back through National Geographic's system, and you wouldn't necessarily have to do anything with Helix ever again once it's done sequencing your DNA.

But say you want to try Vinome, a test that uses insights from your DNA to determine your taste in wine. Since you've already had your spit analyzed, all you have to do is let Vinome access that information, and your results will come back to you in a matter of days, much faster than the six to eight weeks you might otherwise wait with a physical sample. It also cuts down on some of the cost.

It can also introduce more companies to the DNA-testing space. Instead of having to invest in physical labs and sequencing machines, all companies have to do is focus on the software that turns the analyzed DNA into useful reports.

That could change the way we think about DNA. Helix cofounder Justin Kao told Business Insider in July that the hope is to make DNA as seamlessly integrated into people's lives as GPS has become. Through apps like Lyft or Yelp, we don't exactly think of ourselves as using GPS, since it's just something that powers the app.

"That's where we're going with genomics," Kao said. Instead of actively thinking about our DNA, it could just be integrated into an app that tells us about a certain fitness plan.

Helix has so far inked 47 partnerships with companies to run tests on the Helix platform. The tests range in cost from around $20 to hundreds of dollars.